1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing method and an image processing apparatus for carrying out image processing for image data to obtain processed image data, and a program for making a computer execute the image processing method.
The present invention also relates to a data transmitting method and a data transmitting apparatus for transmitting data necessary for a terminal in response to a request from the terminal, and a program for making a computer execute the data transmitting method.
2. Description of the Related Art
There has been known a system for reproducing by use of an output device such as a printer or a monitor image data acquired by an image pickup device such as a digital camera, or image data acquired by using a scanner to read an image recorded on a photographic film. In reproduction of the image data, quality of the reproduced image can be improved by carrying out various image processes such as density conversion, white balance adjustment, tone conversion, saturation emphasis, sharpness processing etc. In this case, conditions for image processing can be acquired by analyzing the image data.
In order to obtain a higher-quality reproduced image, a method has been proposed (U.S. Pat. No. 6,011,547) for carrying out more appropriate image processing by referring to the photographic information added to the image data in image processing, the photo graphic information being added as head information or tag information of the image data. This head information or tag information includes image pickup information indicating photographing conditions such as whether flash is turned ON/OFF, a lighting type, gamma characteristics of a camera, a focal distance of a lens, an F value of the lens, a content of AE processing carried out within the camera and the like. A method has also been proposed that includes information indicating a time and location of photography of the image data into the photographic information by using a GPS function, and based on the photographic information a color temperature of daylight at the time of photography is estimated and in accordance with this white balance adjustment for the image data is carried out (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2000-244940).
The popularization of portable telephones has been remarkable. Recently, camera-equipped portable terminals (hereinafter referred to as a camera-equipped portable terminal) such as camera-equipped portable telephones having photographing means for acquiring image data by photography have become popular (e.g., Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 6 (1994)-233020, 9 (1997)-322114, and 2000-253290). Use of such a camera-equipped portable terminal enables setting of one's favorite image data acquired by photographing as a wallpaper of the portable terminal. Additionally, the image data acquired by photographing can be attached to electronic mail and transmitted to a friend's portable terminal such as a portable telephone or a PDA. Therefore when an engagement has to be cancelled or when there is a possibility of running late for a meeting time, one's own present situation can be notified to the friend, for example by photographing a sorry looking facial expression and transmitting it to the friend. Thus, the portable terminal is convenient for communication with friends.
An image server has been proposed which is equipped with an image processing apparatus for acquiring processed image data after carrying out various image processes to the image data acquired from the camera-equipped portable telephone. Such an image server receives the image data from the camera-equipped portable terminal, carries out image processing as instructed by a user to the image data at the camera-equipped portable terminal, and transmits the processed image data acquired by the image processing to a destination designated by the user at the camera-equipped portable terminal. Further, the image data is stored at the image server, and the image data can be transmitted to a camera-equipped portable terminal when requested therefrom. By carrying out image processing for the image data at such an image server, a high-quality image can be set as the wallpaper, and transmitted to the friend.
As the camera installed in the camera-equipped portable terminal is not one with very advanced functionality, an image represented by the image data acquired by the camera-equipped portable terminal has an undertone, and consequently the image quality is not so good. Hence, for these reasons the methods described in the U.S. Pat. No. 6,011,547 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No.2000-244940, image processing carried out for the image data based on photographic information is conceivable for these images.
However, since the camera installed in the camera-equipped portable terminal is not one with very advanced functionality, it is impossible to obtain the photographic information indicating photographing conditions such as whether flash is turned ON/OFF, a lighting type, gamma characteristics of the camera, a focal distance of a lens, an F value of the lens, a content of AE processing carried out in the camera and the like in photographing which are necessary for the method described in the U.S. Pat. No. 6,011,547. According to the method described in the Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2000-244940, white balance adjustment is carried out for the image data based on a time and location of photography. However, since the quality of the image data acquired by the camera-equipped portable terminal is not so high as described above, it is impossible to obtain a high-quality image by just carrying out the white balance adjustment.
On the other hand, there has been a data communication method proposed (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2000-207216) in which application programs and data files suited to a roaming destination of the portable terminal is stored at a server, and an appropriate application program or data file is transmitted to the portable terminal in accordance with its roaming destination. Additionally, there has been a method proposed (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No.2000-276335) for managing version information of an application program installed in the portable terminal, for constantly storing a latest version of an application program in the server, and for automatically transmitting and installing the application program from the server into the portable terminal if the version of the application program installed in the portable terminal is older than that of the application program stored in the server when the portable terminal accesses the server.
According to the aforementioned methods, since the application program or the data file (simply referred to as data, hereinafter) is transmitted from the server to effectively operate the portable terminal, the portable terminal can always function in an optimal state.
Furthermore, in the case of the camera-equipped portable terminal capable of acquiring image data, by applying the methods described in the Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 2000-207216 and 2000-276335, the application program for image processing is transmitted from the server to the portable terminal. Accordingly, image processing can be carried out for the image data at the portable terminal.
However, because functions provided on portable terminals vary in accordance with the model thereof, in such methods as described in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 2000-207216 and 2000-276335, even if data is automatically transmitted, there are times that the application may not be executed or the data may not be opened at the portable terminal which receives the data. In such cases, because the pointless data uses a communication line, there is a problem of a reduction in transmission efficiency of data from the server.
On the other hand, in the above case, an instruction may be issued from the portable terminal to execute processing by an application program at the server. However, a load on the server is increased which lowers processing efficiency.